#like i was a kid trying to fix myself bc everyone else was exceeding at communicating

[nitunio]

sorry i got the 'cant talk properly and born in the era of most content on proper socialisation and talking being done by social gurus and corporates so now i talk like a corporate and people make fun of me for that' autism and not the quirky social autism

[kkinse]

to live is to suffer

to truly live, outside of just being alive, is to feel pain.

one big difference between people who are abused as children or grow up abused and people who are not is the ability to process pain.

it isnt about "having thick skin" or "withstanding" pain, and although having a support system does help, that isnt the difference either. people who experienced abuse as kids/teens have a distorted framework from which they see pain, and in turn, life.

i just finished watching she-ra and catra's experiences AND actions are a frightening reflection of mine. there is always comparison between people who grew up differently making the same mistakes (glimmer and catra) and people who respond to pain completely differently. (this isnt rly she-ra meta so dont read if ur looking for that.)

for well adjusted people, pain is perceived as a part of life. pain is a sign that you have been hurt, or that you have hurt someone (guilt), or that something is wrong in your environment. the well adjusted person is equipped with a multitude of tools and approaches in confronting their pain. communicating their feelings, asserting their boundaries, acknowledging that they have hurt people and learning from their pain. pain is a catalyst for growth - the crux of life. to feel pain is to live FREELY, to live BETTER.

but for people who have suffered abuse...particularly child abuse, because this is when certain ideas become prominent in the development of their worldviews:

pain is danger. pain is death, even worse than death. i cannot cope with any pain. pain isnt something to be dealt with; it simply is and i have no way to fight it. pain signals to my abuser that their abuse is working. pain signals i am weak. others' pain is my pain, but i cannot put myself in danger. i am helpless against my pain or theirs. pain is a weapon. to avoid pain i must inflict pain. to feel pain is not to live, but to signal that i am doing a bad job at surviving. SURVIVING. it is not living.

its the starkness of glimmer's response to her mistake vs catra to the same mistake. glimmer, upon realising she fucked up - bc her pain and the pain of others told her so - immediately did her best to try and fix the situation. catra spent her life overcompensating and surrendering to the pain, and did so again when confronted with her own guilt.

the recovery of someone like catra initiated with her first attempt to fix her mistakes (saving glimmer). it did not matter if it worked, or if it matched up to everything shes done, or her intentions - what mattered is that she went against everything she believed in about pain and living. all that follows is all centred around completely dismantling and rebuilding her perception of pain and her method of processing pain: the presence of friends, a tangible externalisation of her feelings (melog), and her own effort to acknowledge, OUT LOUD, how she has hurt people and confront them.

this made me think a lot to my own experiences and perception of pain... there is the same running away, surrendering, and over compensation. i paint myself as a bad person so people can stay away - so i dont get hurt. i reject people before they can reject me - so i avoid pain. pain, to me, is humiliating, distressing, and a reflection of my character. if i feel pain then i must deserve it. if i deserve it then i must be bad. if i embrace being a bad person, i can gain control over pain.

ideally id write something heartwarming about how she-ra changed my life and how i am learning to open up and trust others more and allow myself to feel pain... but i cant. catras ending is something i want, and that i have pieces of, but not completely. i still push people away. in this moment i have pushed all but one person away. i live, hypervigilant and sensitive, with the source of my pain. this isnt even to say i didnt try opening up - when i did i got hurt a lot. so much pain, until it exceeded how much i could cope with, and i realised i was barely keeping up my idea of a happy and healthy version of myself.

to live is to suffer. pain is growth. i hope one day i can accept these ideas fully and am able to live my life like everyone else.